Category: Researching

Jeffersonia Hawkins Jones

Jeffersonia Hawkins Jones was my 3rd great grandmother. She was the mother of my grandmother’s (Gerald) grandfather (Davis). Jeffersonia Hawkins Jones was part Creek and part English. She was the most recent of my ancestors […]

DNA and the Geralds of County Clare

This map shows the origins of my brother’s Y-DNA, according to Family Tree DNA. I have no idea what the one red dot in Germany is about. I’m assuming it has to do with migrations […]

Searching for Native American Ancestry

In many ancient cultures, the ancestors were the gods themselves. In most, the ancestors held a sacred space in a person’s spiritual life, and were essential to fashioning personal identity. As a remnant of those […]

DNA, Gerald Family Legends, and History’s Mysteries

Off and on for the past ten years or so, I’ve been interested in tracing my family genealogy. I can trace my Gerald family back to a man named James Gerald who lived in South […]

From R1b1a2a1a1b4 to DF21, or My brother’s DNA reveals he is human after all

I’ve been fascinated with genetic genealogy for a couple of years now. Mainly, I got fascinated when I discovered that not everyone with the last name Gerald living in this country believes my grandfather’s stories […]

R1b1a2a1a1b4: Update from the Great Irish Ancestor Hunt

Not too long ago I wrote about my efforts to determine whether my Gerald ancestors did indeed come from Ireland as I’ve always been told. I only recently discovered that not all of the descendents […]

Luck of the Irish American

(iPhone photo #53 in my 2012 365+1 project) My niece says that her father, my brother, must be Irish because he spots four-leaf clovers like nobody’s business. He doesn’t have to search for them. He […]

A Forum of One

Some people impulsively purchase shoes. I impulsively create websites. One day last week I impulsively created a message board for my own family genealogy. This pretty much immediately felt embarrassing. One, no one uses message […]

Float Like a Butterfly:  Famous Cousins

I’ve been somewhat obsessed with genealogy the past few weeks. I think that’s just the way it happens. You go for years without devoting all that much thought to who your 10th great-grandparents were, and […]

Well, I tried

I thought I was going to be clever and export my Ancestry.com info into my own site where I could more easily share it. I thought I was going to be especially clever in using […]